


Remind me

by Octoberrose11



Series: mpeg [1]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Band Fic, Bottom Louis, Break Up, Eventual Happy Ending, Getting Back Together, I can't think of any tags I'm missing, Implied Zayn Malik/Liam Payne, M/M, Mpreg, Mpreg Louis, but they share that really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 20:53:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11952438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Octoberrose11/pseuds/Octoberrose11
Summary: Louis finds out he’s pregnant three days into the official break, two weeks since he’s seen Harry, and a week and a half since he’s spoken to him. He’s seen the other boys in the past three days, the four of them trying to decide what to do with their time off, and if it would be worth flying home to London or not.He and Harry are not fighting, really they’re not, Louis could call and talk to him if he wanted to, you know, except.Except two weeks ago Harry had sat Louis down and gently said, “You know I love you, Lou, and I know you are it for me but I think we should see other people during this break, just so we can find ourselves.” Louis had tried to protest, had a list of reasons of why they should stay together (number one being that Louis loved Harry, and it went on from there) but Harry couldn’t be swayed.So they’re not fighting, and Louis could call if he wanted to, or needed to, but Harry made it perfectly clear that he doesn’t need or want Louis right now so he won’t. Even though the thing he wants to do the most right now, the thing he’d love to do more then anything in the world, is call Harry and have the other man come hold him.





	Remind me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MADZJACOBS](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MADZJACOBS/gifts).



> God bless the mods of this, seriously. It has been a hell of a time trying to get this finished and posted and they've been so sweet and patient working with me. 
> 
> ALSO god bless my beta (who would like to remain nameless) for working so hard on getting this to the point of being able to be posted. 
> 
> This is rated "mature" for some language and an implied sex scene.
> 
> I'm really not the proudest of this fic (hence why I'm making it a series after authors have been announced!) but I hope you promptee enjoys it anyways. 
> 
> Ta loves!

Now we keep saying that we're OK  
But I don't want to settle for good not great  
I miss the way that it felt back then  
I wanna feel that way again  
-Remind me, Carrie Underwood

\----- Twelve Weeks -----

Louis finds out he’s pregnant three days into the official break, two weeks since he’s seen Harry, and a week and a half since he’s spoken to him. He’s seen the other boys in the past three days, the four of them trying to decide what to do with their time off, and if it would be worth flying home to London or not.

He and Harry are not fighting, really they’re not, Louis could call and talk to him if he wanted to, you know, except.

Except two weeks ago Harry had sat Louis down and gently said, “You know I love you, Lou, and I know you are it for me but I think we should see other people during this break, just so we can find ourselves.” Louis had tried to protest, had a list of reasons of why they should stay together (number one being that Louis loved Harry, and it went on from there) but Harry couldn’t be swayed.

So they’re not fighting, and Louis could call if he wanted to, or needed to, but Harry made it perfectly clear that he doesn’t need or want Louis right now so he won’t. Even though the thing he wants to do the most right now, the thing he’d love to do more then anything in the world, is call Harry and have the other man come hold him.

But he can’t.

So here he sits, six male pregnancy tests around him, all reading “positive” and he breaks. He cries until he can’t cry anymore, then pulls off some toilet paper and wipes his face.

He tells himself that crying isn’t going to do any good. He has to come up with a plan, he decides, shaking off his sadness, running his hand up and down his still mostly flat stomach.

He has to come up with a plan, and decide what he’s going to do and how he’s going to do it. Break ends in three months, not much time at all to do anything.

First order of business is to call Liam and Zayn he decides as he struggles to his feet. Another wave of nausea overtakes him, forcing him back to his knees.

Later.

He’ll call Liam and Zayn later.

*^*^*^*^

Three hours later, when he has a cup of tea in hand he does his best to draw up a game plan, and to figure out where he wants to go from here. Zayn and Liam are both on their way, no doubt together, but until then Louis is completely alone with his thoughts, and he has plenty of them.

Louis had always been aware that he could get pregnant.

Everyone assigned male at birth was tested at the age of seven to see if they carried the gene to get pregnant. Seven year old Louis was over the moon when his mom told him what the official looking letter had said. He could finally be like his mom and have a baby of his own someday!

Jay laughed when he told her that he wanted to be married and have a baby on the way by the time he was nineteen. He had huffed, as offended as a seven year old could be, before Jay had sat him down and told him she would support him no matter what, and stand behind him if that was what he really wanted, but she told him gently, he should enjoy being a kid and being kid free as long as he could.

He assured her that he wanted a million babies, and wanted to be just like her when he grew up.

Except when he got put into the band around ten years later, and had fallen in love with Harry, he’d changed his mind. Okay not really changed his mind, he still adores babies and kids and wants a household full of his own, but after having four younger siblings scream well into the night most nights, the novelty of babies has worn off a little.

So he begged management to let him be put on birth control.

Jay, his mom, had told him no the first few times he had asked. She had her reasoning of course, and Louis respected her enough not to go behind her back (while still living in her home, anyway), and more then once she told him the side effects of what he was going to take out weighed the benefits he might get from it.

Even still management agrees. Or, they allow him to take a nine month prescription, long enough to get through the X Factor tour and to finish their first album, and tell him after they will discuss the issue again.

Four years later he’s pregnant and torn, naked on the floor.

(He’s really got to stop doing that.)

He takes a long drag of his tea, considering his options. He was still on his birth control the last time he slept with Harry. He’s been religiously taking his birth control since he went on them, there’s no way he should have been able to get pregnant. On top of that, more often than not they used condoms when they fucked, easier for the lifestyle they lived.

Louis is shaken from his thoughts when the front door of his house is thrown open, the sound of Liam and Zayn quietly bickering reaches his ears before he sees them. He can’t help but smile a little, he’s missed them (even though he had just seen them the day before). 

“In the kitchen lads!”

Zayn appears first, an angry scowl on his face, an even angrier looking Liam behind him. They’re clearly fighting, it’s more serious than he expected, Liam looks like he could kill Zayn if left alone with him long enough. 

“Louis, tell him that he’s wrong!”

“No, he’s wrong.” Liam throws Zayn a look so cold that Louis would swear that the whole house would freeze if it was possible.

“What are you fighting about now?” He’s tired, so, so, so tired. It seems like all the five of them do anymore is fight, and Louis is so ready for the break. If he doesn’t kill these two before the break even officially begins.

They start trying to explain it to him, talking over each other of course, both fighting their hardest to get Louis to take their side and Louis has had enough. He has a headache and is more nauseous than he was when he woke up, and all he’d love to do is go back to bed or throw up a little or even have a little break down after kicking them both out of his house, but none of that is possible right now. He needs them both, he can’t do this whole pregnancy by himself. 

“Okay stop it, both of you! There’s something serious I need to talk to you about.” He can’t help that he snaps it out, suddenly feeling defeated. 

Zayn and Liam give each other a glare before throwing themselves on the floor beside him. And just like that he’s spilling his gut, from the break up with Harry, to the multiple pregnancy tests he’s left lying on the bathroom counter upstairs. He’s sobbing before he’s halfway through his explanation, shoulders shaking in a way he usually doesn’t let them. 

Liam and Zayn pull him in close between them, trying their best to smother the sadness out of him in the only way they really know how. Liam mutters under his breath about how it’s all going to be okay while Zayn talks about killing Harry for doing this to Louis. 

And this is why he didn’t call Niall. Bless the Irish lad but he’s always been closer to Harry then to him, and while Liam goes back and forth on who he spends the most time with, Zayn has always been Louis’ friend first, has always had his back no matter what the circumstances are. He feels guilty for putting them in the middle of this but he’s no where ready to do this alone. 

When he’s mostly calmed down, Liam finally allows him to pull back, and uses his thumbs to wipe Louis’ cheeks dry. “Better babe?” 

He shrugs, putting a hand on his stomach again. “I don’t think I’ll be better for a long time, Liam.” He tries to say it like it’s a joke, but from the look on the other two men’s faces he knows it falls flat. 

Liam gives him a pitying look. “You know I don’t want to ask, Lou, but have you decided what you’re going to do?”

Zayn gives him a hard look, “Not now, Liam!”

Louis shakes them both off, and tries his best for a laugh. “There’s nothing to do, looks like I’m going to be a father.” He breaks down in tears again, allowing the other two men to hold him close as the worst of the storm passes. 

He prepares himself mentally for the way his stomach is going to grow, the thought that in a few months little hands and feet will be able to be felt moving within him freaks him out in the way little else can, but with a secret smile, he has to admit he can’t wait for it to happen anyways. 

\----- Fourteen Weeks -----

In the past, the fact that Louis hadn’t seen Harry in days would have made him anxious. In the past around this time he would have jumped on a flight to wherever Harry was and laid low, as long as it meant he could be wherever Harry was. 

Now though he has other things to think about, like the fact that (laughingly surprising) the nurse thinks that Liam is the father of his child. He’d feel bad about laughing, he really would, be the look on Liam’s face when the nurse asked was enough to make him break down in laughing sobs. 

He had tried insisting that he could go to the doctor appointment alone, it wasn’t like he didn’t know what was going to happen after all, he’d been to enough appointments with his mom when she was pregnant, but Liam and Zayn had put their feet down and insisted at least one of them had to attend each appointment, less he get it in his head he was going to raise the baby alone. 

(Louis wouldn’t admit it but it meant a lot, hearing the two of them bicker in the corner of the room while the doctor did an internal ultrasound, both trying to act like they’re giving him privacy but he knows they’re both watching from the corner of their eyes, trying to bite down wide smiles.)

“So the baby is right on schedule size wise,” the nurse says, interpreting Louis’ inner musings. “A little on the small side, but nothing to be worried about at this point.” 

By this point Liam is shaking with excitement, leaning forward in his seat, looking like for all the world that he would jump up and take over the scan if he had to. “Can you tell the sex yet?” 

Nurse Admia gives him a patient smile, “Not for a few more weeks, I’m afraid, and that really depends on if they’ll work with us.” 

Zayn lets out a snort. “With Tommo as a father you know it won’t work with you at all then.” 

Louis’ too busy watching the tiny legs move on screen to be offended. His baby is a real thing now, though it always has been real, seeing it like this has put things into perspective. He really does need to rethink not telling Harry. 

Not now though. 

\----- Sixteen Weeks -----

They’re back in the studio, him and Liam, trying to get some writing done for the new album, when Harry walks in. It’s the first time Louis has seen him since they broke up (or took a break, whatever the fuck you want to call it) and Louis is ashamed to admit that something stirs in his stomach when he looks up and sees the jeans the other man has on. 

He blames the baby, of course it has to be the baby knowing it’s other father is close by. It’s no way that Louis still wants Harry with everything in his being, nope. It has nothing to do with the fact that Harry’s side of the bed doesn’t smell like him anymore, or the fact that Louis’ can’t fit into the few clothes Harry had left behind when he had left. It doesn’t have to do with that at all because that would be being needy as fuck and if there’s one thing Louis isn’t it’s needy. 

The thing is Harry looks good, though he always looks good so that’s pointless to point out. Louis doesn’t look that bad himself, if the beaming smile Liam had greeted him with earlier was anything to go by. He’s put on minumum baby weight, though all of the doctors he’s seen since finding out he was pregnant tells him the baby is growing at a normal weight and looks completely healthy so he’s not concerned, he still grabs a pillow from beside him and hugs it to his chest, trying his best to hide his bump. 

Liam looks at him questioningly. “Still haven’t told him yet?” he asks under his breath, pencil still moving on his paper. 

“No, and I don’t plan to.” Louis doesn’t even bother looking up from the piano in his lap, concentrating harder on trying to make the melody for the new song work just right. 

Liam’s pencil stops moving, “Lou, don’t you think he deserves to know he’s going to be a father?” His voice gets even quieter, if that’s even possible. He’s being gentle in a way he wouldn’t have been before Harry left, before he announced the baby, and Louis hates it. He hates it even more that he understands why. 

“No, I don’t.” His voice is equally as soft, though sharp. “He is apparently fucking happy to not have me in his life, there’s no way in hell I’m letting him near a child of mine.” It’s unfair but life isn’t fair sometimes, and who would know it better than Louis himself. 

Liam sighs, but after a quick glance at Harry (who was now looking in their direction) picked his pencil back up and started writing again. “What are you going to do when the baby is born then? Have you even thought that far?” 

“Hopefully it’ll take after me and be really fucking small and I can pass off it being a one night stand.”

Liam drops the pencil and turns to stare at him. “That is possibly the stupidest thing you’ve ever said, and you’ve said some pretty dumb shit.” 

“How you figure?” 

Liam rolls his eyes before glancing over in Harry’s direction, who is now watching them closely, a confused look on his face. “A one night stand would lead to a premature baby, which would lead to a NICU stay so no one is going to buy that. Once the baby’s born, mate, he’s either going to think that it’s his and you didn't trust him enough to tell him, or that you cheated and didn’t want to admit to it so you let him break it off with you so he wouldn’t find out, and then there goes your chances of ever getting back together with him.” Liam shrugs at the look on Louis’ face. 

Thing is, this should be the happiest time in Louis’ life- he’s having a baby! He should be picking out baby names that would go nicely with “Tomlinson-Styles”, he should be shopping for cute little baby clothes and shoes, and picking out a theme for the nursery here in London, and one for their house in LA. He should be on top of the world, giggling with his mom while they trade pregnancy secrets and compare bump sizes, but he hasn’t even told her yet. He’s incredibly proud of his mom, maybe almost as proud as she is of him, for raising him alone, and then continuing to raise the girls after dad- Mark- left. She never gave up, and she always did her best to provide for all of them and to keep them all happy, but he had promised them both years ago that he would never follow in her footsteps. 

Yet here he is, single (mostly), with a baby on the way, and no clue how to tell the baby’s father. 

Liam apparently takes his silence the wrong way, biting his lip in apology. “I’m sorry Lou, I didn’t mean to make you mad.” 

He shakes his head, forcing his eyes away from the rose ring on Harry’s finger, “You didn’t mate, it’s okay. I’ve got a lot on my mind anyways.” He forces a smile. “You gave me a lot to think about anyways.”

“So you’re going to tell Harry then?” 

“Tell me what?” Both jump, not expecting Harry to suddenly be beside them. He stares at them expectantly, blinking at them owlishly. 

Liam smacks his notebook closed, giving a fake grin. “Well I think this is my cue to leave, I’ll be seeing you tomorrow Lou, don’t forget the appointment is at noon.” 

Louis tried to convey that he was going to kill lIam the next time he saw him through eye contact but Liam either didn’t receive the message or was choosing to ignore it, as he gave them a cheery wave and left, a happy bounce in his step. 

Louis sighs before turning his attention back to Harry, who still standing beside him, now looking even more confused than before. “So, do you want to go get some lunch? This might take a while to explain.”

*^*^*^

THIS MIGHT JUST BE THE MOST AWKWARD LUNCH I’VE EVER BEEN TOO, ZAYN SAVE ME

Louis forces a smile for the waiter’s sake, who’s too busy trying to place his water glass in front of him to notice, as he slyly tries to put his phone away before Harry notices he was texting at the table. The other man takes his seat and offers him a weak smile. 

“Know what you’re going to order?” 

Louis shrugs, “Probably a salad.” Nothing else looks good, to be fair, and the baby has been making him crave salad dressing like it was going out of style. Hell, he could probably drink some straight out of the bottle tonight and be happy with it. 

Harry bites his lip, “I know I don’t have the right to tell you what to do anymore, Lou, but you’ve got to take care of yourself. You can’t let yourself suffer because of a mistake I made.” 

They both stilled, staring at each other in shock. For a moment it was like a sudden calm before a tornado touches down, everything still and quiet. Even the noise in the restaurant seems to have been muted before it all rushes back in. Louis mumbles a curse word under his breath, reaching down to pick up the knife he dropped while Harry tries to wave down their waiter for a new glass of water, his now spilled across the table and his lap. 

“What mistake did you make?” Louis asks, heart in his throat. 

Harry shifts in his chair, a wave of pain crossing his face. “I shouldn’t have broken up with you like I did,” he admits, “or broken up with you period. I- I felt like I was holding you back from all your potential and that I should end us before you saw I was and decided to end it yourself. I’ve known since I was sixteen that you’re it for me, Lou, probably before I even knew what love was I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, however you would let me.” 

“You know, don’t you? That’s why you’re saying all of this. You don’t really mean it, I know you don’t. You broke up with me because you wanted your freedom, you said so yourself, that you wanted to be able to see and do whoever you wanted to without me in your way.” 

“....What exactly is it that I know?” 

“That I’m pregnant, that you’re the father?” Louis’ voice comes out louder than he expected, bouncing around the mostly empty restaurant. He slinks down in his chair when everyone turns to stare, his face paling. 

Harry bites his lip, even as he shakes his head. “I swear to god, Lou, I didn’t know. Why the fuck didn’t I know? You know what, that doesn’t even matter right now.” He stands up and throws some money on the table, more than enough to cover the cost of their waters. “Come on Louis, let’s go. I think we have a lot to talk about.”

*^*^*^*^

They end up at a park a couple blocks away, sharing Louis’ front seat. There’s a little girl swinging on the swings so they both pay more attention to her than each other. 

 

“When did you find out?” Harry eventually asks, voice quiet. “Was it before-?”

“No. We’d been broken up for about two weeks by the time I found out.” Louis’ voice is equally as quiet, though his shakes. He wraps his arms around himself in an attempt of self comfort, but it doesn’t work well. 

“Who all knows?” 

“Liam. Zayn. Me. And now you.” 

“You haven’t even told Jay yet?!” Harry finally turns to look at Louis, no doubt troubled to know that Louis was carrying a secret around like this mostly on his own. 

“No. I hadn’t even told her you’d broken up with me yet, so I didn’t know how to explain the baby situation.” He shrugs. “She was strong enough to be a single mom twice over, and I’ll always be proud of her and in awe of her but I didn’t know how to go to her and tell her I didn’t know how to do this on my own.” 

“So you didn’t plan to tell me.” Harry nods to himself. “I figured you didn’t but it doesn’t hurt any less to be proven right.”

“Harry, you said you wanted your freedom, freedom doesn’t mean tying you to myself with a baby, and you know it. I didn’t want you to hate me or blame me for this anymore then you already did. I didn’t want you to blame this baby for existing and keeping you from living your life the way you want to, when this baby didn’t ask for fucked up parents or to be born.”

“Lou,” just hearing Harry say his name like he used to made tears finally spill over from Louis’ eyes, “I made the biggest fucking mistake in letting you go. I haven’t been eating or sleeping without you in my life. I’m miserable all the time, Niall said if I came crying to him about you one more time and didn’t do anything about it he was going to push me off the top of the highest building he could find. I’ve tried calling you and leaving you voice mails but they haven’t been going through. I don’t know how to live without you, and that’s so co dependent and gross but you’ve been my whole world since I was sixteen, and I want you, for real, to be my whole world until I die. 

“Please Lou, let me fix this mistake. Please let me fix this mistake, please give me another chance.” 

“I’m scared. I’m so scared Harry, I want to say yes but I don’t want you to hurt me again. And it’s just not me you’d be walking out on next time, it would be our baby too.” 

Harry reaches over and takes Louis’ face in his hands, thumbing away tears as they fall. “I’m scared too. I’m always going to be scared, I think, but I’d rather be scared with you. With our baby. Please, please Lou, give me another chance.” 

Closing his eyes Louis nods, “Okay. Okay.” 

And as Harry kisses him in the way Louis has been missing ever since he found out about the baby, he wonders if he’s just made the biggest mistake of his life. 

But when they welcome their daughter Raechel into the world later that year, he takes on look at Harry cradling their newborn and knows, with all of his heart, that if it was the biggest mistake, then he’d rather make the same one over again if it meant seeing that look on Harry’s face.


End file.
